1,759Hello everyone,
I was surprised to see that only one person in the reviews figured out the solution to Harry's problem. I won't ruin it, though.
Dude, it is a crazy time we live in right now. I don't think I need to say anything other than that, right?
Anyway, on to the chapter. Authors note at the bottom. Follow me on instagram at wtmcdonaldauthor.
Disclaimer: I own nothing.
"I'm a horcrux."
I sat next to my beloved and nodded my head at Harry. My mind raced as I considered the implications of the information. I looked up at my friend.
Harry stood there, gripping the Elder Wand in his right hand, and holding his forehead with his left. His disgust was written all over his face.
"Voldemort's soul is right here?!" Harry raged. "I want it out!"
I tried not to look at him with pity, but I knew my eyes gave me away, so I broke eye contact.
"How do we get it out, Ron?!" Harry asked, panicking.
"Panic won't help." Fleur spoke up beside me. "Occlumency, Harry."
I realized that I wasn't exactly losing control over my emotions. Normally, I would have to actively try in stressful situations, but now that I had absolute control over my magic, it seemed easier to hold it together.
Occlumency is magic-based, so it makes sense. I pondered.
Harry closed his eyes, and I could tell he was doing as Fleur suggested and getting himself together. He stood there for a few moments, while I considered the situation.
Dumbledore raised him to sacrifice himself. I thought. But I have taught Harry to be more selfish, directly undermining that. He'll never walk to his own death.
"Is it possible to get this thing off of me?" Harry asked me now that he was calmer.
"Dumbledore said that Tom Riddle's diary was a horcrux." I reasoned. I already knew the ways of destroying horcruxes, but I didn't want to reveal my meta-knowledge. I had already told the only person I planned on telling, Fleur. That was enough.
"So we can assume that Basilisk Venom is one way. I think only extremely powerful spells could also do it. Fiendfyre, off of the top of my head." I said, giving them the answer while playing it off as guesses.
"So I have to kill myself?!" Harry asked, exasperated. "Not an option."
Well that gives me my answer as to whether or not he is willing to sacrifice himself. I thought.
Tonks had become deathly quiet and her hair had turned white. No doubt, her mind was running through options like the rest of us.
"A horcrux is a piece of a soul, yes?" Fleur's voice cut through our conversation.
Harry and I looked to her, and we both nodded in confirmation. "Yes." I answered.
"Tell me what you saw in your mind." Fleur said as she stood up. She walked over to where my blood had laid on the ground, now there was only a charred piece of flooring where it once was.
"I don't think it was my mind." I answered pretty quickly. "I think it was…" I paused for a moment, as my mind connected the dots as to what she was suggesting.
No way. I thought.
"Your soul." Fleur answered confidently. She turned back to me, and there wasn't a question in her eyes. Her eyes displayed confidence.
"The Mind Palace is the answer." Fleur revealed.
Harry's head perked up as she said that. I was currently whipping my own ass in my mind because I didn't see it sooner.
Of course. I saw everything there. My mind, body, soul. It was all there. I thought as I considered her proposal.
"That's easy then." Harry said, wanting it to be the answer.
"Don't be so sure." I told him, thinking back to my own experience.
"What do you mean?" Harry asked. His face pleaded for me not to crush his hope.
"When I was in, all I did was clean things up a bit, and gain better access to my magic. You'll be doing something completely different." I told him. "That'll be a fundamental change."
Harry paced a bit, and thought it over before responding. "So you don't think I should do it?"
"Oh that's not it at all." I disagreed. "Dumbledore is dead my friend, and we have been found lacking. You have to do it, but you will have to be more disciplined than I was. Clean up, don't change anything. You might even be able to see the link between you two in there. Expel it, nothing else. For the love of all that is holy, do not let it influence you at all, just get rid of it. And don't forget about the double-casting."
Harry stared at me for a moment, and thought about it. No doubt, he was feeling scared because of my warning. But I was willing to bet that his fear of the horcrux outweighed it. Then, without warning, he turned around, waved his wand and his clothes disappeared.
I got a great look at his pearly white ass, and immediately started laughing at his little joke. "You're blinding me mate." I said as I held a hand up in front of my eyes like it was the sun.
I got a middle finger in return.
"Nice ass!" Tonks commented with a gin, as he walked forward toward where his blood lay on the ground.
"What ass?" Fleur's voice said as she walked back up and stood beside me. I snorted at the joke, and once again we got a middle finger from Harry. Harry stood there for a few moments staring at his blood on the ground.
After a while, I decided to give him another warning. "Complete control." I said, knowing that he got the message.
Fleur huffed beside me and rolled her eyes. "Pussy." She said.
Harry walked forward into the ritual, and immediately went as still as a statue. The blood around him lit up in a green flame.
"How long did it take me?" I asked Fleur beside me.
"Thirty-seconds." She answered.
"That fas…"
An eerie howling rang throughout the room, interrupting what I was about to say and causing us to cover our ears. I looked up to Harry and saw a black smoke-like ichor pour out of his head and into the air around him. It coalesced into a screaming face, and once again, the howling tore through the room. The whole time, Harry's body didn't move.
I gripped my wand a little tighter, and prepared myself to intervene, although I knew that I couldn't do it while he was still in the ritual.
And then, as quick as it came, it dissipated into the air, and traveled upwards through the ceiling onto whatever afterlife parts of souls go to. I expected Harry to come out of his Mind Palace immediately, but that didn't happen.
The room became very very quiet now that the horcrux wasn't screaming because of its death. Fleur, Tonks, and I stared at Harry, waiting to see some sign that he was ok. We didn't for another minute. I estimated that it was the minute and a half mark that the green flame burnt out all of his blood on the floor and Harry moved again.
I stepped forward, in front of Fleur and Tonks, prepared to face Voldemort looking through Harry's eyes. Instead, Harry's emerald green met mine as he turned around.
He was heaving, as if he just ran a marathon. A black ink like substance ran down the right side of his face and on to his neck. It looked like tar at first, but more ….active. Small tendrils would whither for a second before falling still.
Tonks gasped beside me at the sight of his face.
"You alright, mate?" I asked, hesitantly.
Harry nodded, and the movement caused him to feel the liquid on his face. He reached up and touched the soul residue and frowned in disgust.
"That fucking hurt." Harry said as he walked forward and grabbed his wand on the floor. With a flick, the ichor disappeared from his face. "But it's gone."
"Are you sure?" I asked, quickly.
"One-hundred percent." Harry replied confidently. "And you're right, I could see the connection."
"What did it look like?" I asked a little too curiously.
"It was a mirror, and when I passed by it, I saw Tom." Harry explained. "And then I could see through his eyes. So I destroyed the mirror." Harry answered.
I let out a breath I didn't know I was holding, and relaxed for a moment. I wanted to make more inquiries, but it was his 'Mind Palace' and I didn't want to intrude on such a personal thing. It literally represented all he was.
"How do you feel?" I asked him.
I personally felt amazing, like everything was crystal clear. Information came to the front of my mind quickly and efficiently. My magic rolled under my skin, completely controlled and read to enact my will.
"Like I had a Hogwarts sized burden on my shoulders, and it's been lifted." Harry answered with a smile. "And tired." He added on at the end.
I agreed with him. The stress of the day was catching up to me also, but my rituals didn't allow me to get tired easily.
"What now?" Tonks summed up our thoughts, now that the rituals had happened.
There were a couple of things I could think of off the top of my head.
Helga Hufflepuff's Dup, Salazar Slytherin's Locket, Rowena Ravenclaw's diadem, and Nagini are all that are left now. And then we have to actually succeed in killing Voldemort. I thought to myself.
When I answered Tonks, it was none of these. Instead my stomach had defeated my brain and willpower.
"Dinner."
"I can't tell him." I told Fleur.
We were laying in bed. I stared at her massive pregnancy belly, and rubbed my hand all over it. The little human in there squirmed around, apparently sensing my presence. I smiled, and realized I would burn the world down for the baby inside.
"No, I don't think you should." Fleur agreed as she ran her hands through my hair.
"I don't know how much the ritual actually affected him." I reasoned.
Fleur moaned an approval.
"What if it changes him?" I asked. "Like it did Grindelwald."
"You can't control that." Fleur retorted. "So why worry?"
"I can't help it, unfortunately. He's my best friend." I answered her quickly.
"You're only friend." Fleur teased.
I smiled, used to her telling me that I needed to interact with people more. Apparently I was a bit of a workaholic. I couldn't exactly disagree with her.
"I have you." I said, trying to distract her with mushiness. She just raised an eyebrow, not buying it at all.
I smiled, knowing that it didn't work. "I'll have to come up with a story, to explain how I know of the other horcruxes." I said, bringing up another topic.
"How will you do it?" Fleur asked.
She knows I already have a plan. I thought.
"Well, I think the most believable thing would be to make him believe Dumbledore told me." I said, revealing the simple plan. "I was thinking of making a dummy Dumbledore notebook, and just forge his handwriting that lists the horcruxes, but say nothing else. I feel like that would be something he would do."
"He will ask why you haven't brought it up in the last few days." Fleur said, trying to find flaws in the argument.
I thought for a moment before answering. "I could claim that he cracked my runic code to the journal's and put a timer on when the words would show up in my notebook. Harry saw his brilliance first hand the night Dumbledore died and would believe it."
Fleur nodded, satisfied. "That'll work. What about if he asks about the hidden information in your mind?"
That brought up another problem. Before the ritual, I wouldn't have believed Death existed as an entity. But the symbol on the willow tree in my mind palace made me question that belief. Someone extremely powerful had to do it, there had to be some explanation. If it was a wizard, they would be the most powerful wizard ever even conceived.
"I don't even know what caused that taboo for me… all I know is that I can now understand the concept of horcruxes. And I also know what and where the horcruxes are." I said. "I could just say that it was a byproduct of an earlier ritual? One that I messed up?"
Fleur hummed and thought about it. "It seems like a shallow answer."
I agreed with her, of course. "It is. But that's because I don't even have answers."
We fell into silence after that, and I continued to poke and prod her stomach gently while she played with my hair. I almost went to sleep a couple of times.
"What happens after the horcruxes?" Fleur asked.
I thought about that, and the time frame I had to work with. "Well, I would like to avoid Voldemort's takeover of the ministry." I answered.
"August 1st." Fleur said. I had already told her it was coming.
"Yes." I said, simply.
"That is less than a month away." She whispered.
I knew what she was thinking about. The baby. Her due date was rapidly approaching, and it wouldn't be a stretch to say that she could give birth around the same time.
"I don't want my child coming into a world where Voldemort still lives." I told her truthfully.
"I guess I will have to hold her in until then." Fleur said matter-of-factly.
"Her?" I asked. "Are you so sure?"
"I am her mother, of course I am sure." Fleur said as confident as she was the world was round.
I smiled, perfectly ok with having a daughter. In fact, it sounded perfect.
"I just have to figure out how to break into Gringotts without the goblins hating me until the end of time." I said.
Fleur smiled, as if she knew something I didn't.
"I think I can help with that."
"Look at what I found in my notebook."
Harry craned his neck and looked down at the notebook in my hands. At the top, Dumbledore's name was drawn rather spectacularly.
'Salazar Slytherin's Locket.
Helga Hufflepuff's Cup.
Rowena Ravenclaw's Diadem.
Nagini, the snake.'
Harry's eyes roamed over the writing. "Horcruxes?"
I nodded and smiled. Harry's reaction actually seemed much more controlled than I expected.
"That's a relief. I thought he said there were seven." Harry said with a big sigh.
There is the reaction I wanted. I thought.
"Three have already been destroyed." I answered quickly. "Tom Riddle's Diary. The Gaunt Families ring. And you."
Harry nodded. "So now that we know what it is, we just have to track down where they are at." Harry said, a little relieved.
"Well I have been thinking about that." I said. "Who was in possession of Tom Riddle's Diary?"
"Wasn't it Lucius?" Harry asked.
"Yep. What if he repeated that mistake, and trusted some of his inner circle with the horcruxes?" I asked, making a reasonable jump to a conclusion.
"That would make sense." Harry said. "But how do we know which ones?"
"We won't." I lied. "But I already asked Nott and Snape to look into it. They haven't responded."
It was all a lie, of course. I was going to pull the same trick as I did with Dumbledore. Make a dummy notebook and forge Nott and Snape's handwriting to give us the answers.
"So what do we do now? We wait?" Harry asked, a little frustrated.
"Not exactly." I told him, and held up a necklace. It was the fake Slytherin Locket from the cave. "I've been thinking about what R.A.B. means."
Harry didn't answer, instead he just stared at me, waiting for me to continue, so I did. "What was Sirius' brother's name?" I asked.
Harry, once again didn't answer me, and just waited for me to continue. "Just tell me you found one, mate."
I'm becoming predictable. I realized. And he isn't even questioning when I did all this research.
"Fine. Regulus Arcturus Black, fell in with the Death Eaters sometime during school. Disappeared at the end of the war. Nobody knows what happened to him." I answered Harry.
Harry sighed. "So another dead end? How will he be able to help us?"
"Who was around then, that must have been close with Sirius' mysterious brother?" I asked dramatically.
"Sirius?" Harry asked, jumping to the obvious conclusion.
I shook my head, and waited for him to guess again.
"Kreacher."
The house elf appeared in front of Harry and I with a 'pop'. The old elf looked up at us with a little less content than he used to.
"Blood-traitor masters." Kreacher mumbled to us.
I rolled my eyes. "Exactly." I said, confirming Harry's guess.
Kreacher let out a cry, as his eyes saw what was dangling from my hand.
"How does filthy masters have master Regulus' locket?!" Kreacher cried out. His hand moved to snap, and I just reacted without thinking.
Before he could bring his arm up, I had closed the distance and my wand was at his throat. "Enough!" I commanded, and he obeyed.
Kreacher cowed beneath my wand and command. Now that I was a Black in name, he had to obey me. I felt bad for a moment as I saw the reaction, but put it in the back of my mind. It needed to be done.
"You recognize this?" I asked the house elf.
Kreacher nodded his head.
"Do you know where the real one is?" I asked him.
He didn't respond at first. Instead, he bowed his head and started mumbling. "Kreacher failed master. Kreacher couldn't destroy it, he couldn't."
I jumped on the opportunity. "I can, Kreacher. I can destroy it." I said.
Kreacher's eyes snapped up to me. "Filthy master lies!" Kreacher hissed.
That actually surprised me, I didn't expect him to react so strongly. "Bring it to me, now!" I commanded the elf.
Kreacher flinched as if I had just hit him, and his head twitched. He didn't obey immediately.
Is he fighting against the command? I wondered, surprised at the elf's loyalty to his old master.
After a cry, where Kreacher's magic apparently hurt him, he raised a hand and snapped.
The most malicious feeling thing I had ever sensed appeared in the room and dropped to the floor in front of me. Instantly my mental shields were assaulted with powerful emotions. I blocked it easily, and threw it off of my mind.
I looked to see that Harry was staring at the object, curiously. He seemed intrigued, but didn't have the same reaction I did. It made sense. He had lived with one in his head for all of his life, must have just been used to it.
My wand rose and I brought the most destructive thought I could think of to the forefront of my mind.
A small, snake-like flame appeared out of my wand and slithered over to the locket. I dominated the will of the flame and kept it small and controlled. I did not want to almost lose control over the fiendfyre like last time. Although, I noticed it was much easier to control this time. It's whispers were easily thrown out of my mind and didn't affect me at all.
As soon as it touched the locket, black smoke poured out of it and tried to coalesce into the air like it did with Harry. However, the fiendfyre didn't allow it to.
With a sizzling sound, the black smoke was actually eaten up by the flame. It was the weirdest thing. It looked like I was watching a fire in reverse. Normally, black smoke will billow out of the fire, not into it. It was fascinating. And then, just as quick as it started, the black smoke stopped, and I cut off the magic to the fiendfyre.
When it disappeared, I looked around for any trace of the horcrux. I was unsuccessful. That was the problem with fiendfyre, it left almost no trace of the object.
I just destroyed one of the most powerful wizards of all time's locket. A priceless artifact that people would kill for. I realized. And I am going to do it to two more objects.
"Bloody hell, is that what it looked like?" Harry asked beside me.
"Yours was worse, the fiendfyre controlled it a bit more. And there was no screeching. I thought I was going to burst my eardrums with yours." I answered him.
"Master destroyed it. Master destroyed it!" Kreacher exclaimed, and looked to me with a smile. It was the first time I had ever seen him smile. It was actually extremely creepy and I didn't like it. It did not slip my mind that he didn't call us 'blood-traitor' or 'filthy master'.
"Now we just have to do that three more times." I said, as the elf disappeared. Probably to go clean somewhere.
"Seems easy enough."
A/N: Boom!
So Harry actually dealt with the Horcrux. I know some people will think that this is too easy, and that it should have been a little more difficult. I will just say… be patient my friend.
What did we think? We got some Fleur in there. Some planning. Harry's horcrux. Slytherin's locket. A lot of things got checked off the list today.
Let's talk about it in the reviews!
